Selling America To The Foreigners

The New York Sun takes a look at former DDB CEO Keith Reinhard’s efforts to promote America overseas:

Though some of the worldwide antipathy toward America stems from unpopular policies, Mr. Reinhard says it is not a matter of simply a feel-good issue — Businesses are being hurt by our sagging reputation. In an increasingly competitive world, he says we need all the help we can get.
Having managed a company with offices in 96 countries, Mr. Reinhard says, “I knew something about the resentments people felt about Americans around the world. These had been building for some time — really since the fall of communism. Some of it is envy of our success, some is that the U.S. took on the fall guy role.”
To prove the point, Mr. Reinhard produces surveys showing that in countries such as Germany, Indonesia, Turkey, Egypt, and even Great Britain, the majority of people think America has a mainly negative influence on the world.

So will our election have an effect on this? How’s the Presidential race looking overseas? I’d love to hear from some of our international AdPulp readers.

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Blogging on AdPulp since 2005, Dan Goldgeier is a Seattle-based freelance copywriter with experience at advertising agencies across the U.S. He is a graduate of the Creative Circus ad school, and currently teaches at Seattle's School of Visual Concepts. In addition, he is a regular columnist for TalentZoo.com. Dan published the best of his TalentZoo.com columns in a book entitled View From The Cheap Seats: A Broader Look at Advertising, Marketing, Branding, Global Politics, Office Politics, Sexual Politics, and Getting Drunk During a Job Interview. Look for it on Amazon in paperback and e-book editions.

Comments

I imagine much of the world cares about the US Presidential race only marginally more than US citizens might care about any other major national election overseas. Unfortunately your race has taken over an alarmingly high number of posts in my RSS reader!

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